A Crackin' Day! Tues. July 20th

A big day- we went through most of the choral sections of the play, making leaps and bounds forward in our exploration and there were some very exciting moments.

Here's the company rehearsing a scene from the play- when the people of Thamesmead learn about Smackheaded Peter's vision of bringing peace on earth with low-cost heroin... (A little disturbing to rehearse this section in a church?)



This is a big, beefy beast of a play and it's challenging us all: creating physicality for the drug sections, playing large Choral scenes, taking heroin on stage... I'm also taking a conceptual approach to the play which, on a new play, is unusual for me...More about that later. The main experience from yesterday is that the "we're beginning to get there" feeling was emerging ... Yee Ha!

We had the full company together for most of the afternoon and it was delight to have the energy, focus and expertise of everyone in the room. Great strides, great strides forward.

We've moved into the church sanctuary this week: an accidental double-booking at the church. Although it's got it's challenges, (water dripping through some light fixtures and sometimes-smelly AC) it's also lovely to have the light from the stain-glassed windows in the room. It's a little odd to be rehearsing a play with a messiah-like figure in it, inside a church, but it may be helping...

Here's the Holy Family from Parkdale United Church



Lots of producing things to work on in the evening-

A cracking day!

Week Three begins...

The weekend was mostly spent organizing things for the week ahead: taking our postcard design to the printer, working on the rehearsal schedule, trimming the script, talking to some of the actors about the trimming, working briefly with our Assistant Director, Andrew McNaughton, to get our wee video done, chat with Designer Brandon Kleiman, seeing a play, beginning to organize our company mail outs, blogging...starting to get ready for the next play (which starts soon!)-

And a bit of relaxation.

And now- ready to leap into action and looking forward to the next layer in the process!

Onwards and Upwards.

Fail not for sorrow, falter not for sin,
But onward, upward, till the goal ye win.
- Francis Anne Kemble (1809-1893)

Here we go...

and we'll keep on moving!

Booking a Tantie- End of Week Two

Time and Money...Time and money- we'll just have to make it work with the Time that we have...

This is what was going through my head a lot yesterday- while we were doing our first stagger-through of the play. The actors were doing really well in the scenes that we've rehearsed, it's just that we need more time together as a full company- especially for the Choral sections...and yesterday our stagger-through had the full company for about 20 mins of the piece.

We did have a very productive afternoon- including an excellent conversation about the Qualities Shared by Innovative thinkers. I shared a BBC new article on the subject with the company. Here's the link:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-10653786

We also did as much on the ensemble sections of the play as we could- and we made good progress... And please, let me clear that there were lots of very good things going on in the stagger-through and I'm sure we'll have a wonderful production in the end... it's just that I'm a wee bit frustrated by this process.

There's part of me that would like to have a tantrum, throw my toys out of the pram (is the UK expression) and I knooooow (as a grown-up) that there's really no point and and I know that to "get the play done" that I need to stay solution-oriented and I knowwwwww that "it's only a play" and that I need to trust the rehearsal process and it will all come together... But oooohhhh, couldn't I just have oooooonne little tantrum, sometime, please?

There's a theatre expression in the UK called "Booking a Tantie". A Tantie is the cute form of tantrum. As some of us may know, frustration may sometimes appear during the rehearsal process and when it does arrive it can be for lots of different reasons. It may be that there's a difference between what the actor/director feels is needed for the scene, compared to how it's currently working in rehearsal. So, often, humor diffuses this tension. I've often heard/seen the humor come from other actors in the room... "oooo, she's going to need to book a Tantie!" or "Have you booked your Tantie this afternoon?"(both expressed with generosity, rather than dripping sarcastic mockery) Or someone may ask, "would you like to book your Tantie now?" It's a UK way of acknowledging, allowing and diffusing the frustration- and it can work- as long as there's generally been acknowledging, allowing, compassion and humor in the rehearsal process.

Yesterday I didn't have a Tantie... I did share my desire to have one, but only after rehearsals were done. I just wanted to get on with the work in the time that we had together- and we did have a very good afternoon- to which I say, "Hurrah!"

And this weekend, I'm going to think about how I can rehearse differently- and maintain my ensemble approach to the play.

And although at the moment our potential Full Company time feels like this-



and I'd like to do this...



I'm going to turn that wee perspective around- keep positive and keep going.

And I may just give myself a bit of Time off today...

July 15th- marching and cardboard

I mentioned last week that two of the challenges of making a piece of theatre in the current rehearsal process are our old chums/enemies time and money... Well, for the first time in almost two weeks of rehearsal we had everyone in the room at the same time- and I am compelled to write that it was delightful, truly delightful! and we enjoyed nearly an hour together.

We started the day by sharing our 'unison experiences': singing in choirs, martial arts practice, dancing in musicals, playing in bands, doing Greek choral work (mostly in theatre training) and from Richard Stewart, marching. It was one of those excellent moments in a rehearsal room when the assembled group acknowledges the expertise of its members. So, (Richard leading) the actors learned how the differences between standing at attention, at ease, easy, turning and marching. And then, briefly, in groups of three, people marched, as Richard kept everyone 'in time'. I watched, delighted as everyone dove into this simple-yet-different experience- people wrinkled noses, shuddered at they're own abilities, delighted in moments that worked and we all had a good laugh. It was the fastest company bonding I've experienced in some time.

We then carried on with our game 'who moves what, where and when?' (scene changes), and finished that game on the rest of the play.

The rest of the morning zoomed by with a rehearsal of the beginning of the play. We've discovered the 'company action' for the beginning of the piece- it's 'Intervention'. I'll come back to this development another time-

The afternoon was spent working on drug hallucinations and choral work- lots of progress- and we finished the day recapping scenes with Emily and Marilla.

After that we had a production meeting; the production manager, set/costume designer, stage manager and I sat down and talked through all aspects of the production. That took about 90 minutes, lots to talk about...

We then went and picked up some of the cardboard for our set; Thursday is recycling day in Parkdale and there's excellent free cardboard available. Thank goodness we're taking a 'poor theatre approach' with this play and that it matches the socio-economic realities of the world represented in the play! Ah, money... our other friend/enemy.


(this isn't where we went shopping- but it's an example of the cardboard 'riches' available...)

I've said it once and I'll say it again- it's wonderful that the style of theatre we're exploring matches up with the 'world of the play' and philosophy on recycling!

Thanks for reading... it's been quite a day...

July 14th- Choral work a go-go

We worked a lot today on choral sections of the play- But we'll be dressing the actors in The Sad and Cautionary Tale of Smackheaded Peter in contemporary clothes, rather than traditional Greek costumes.



During the morning I remind myself a few times that conforming to choral work or 'speaking with one voice' can be challenging for many actors. I also remember that I had years of dance training and choir practices when we all moved or sang in unison- and that those hours built up my trust in the cumulative power of many people working in unison... It's the opposite of much of our contemporary actor training, mine included. And to many actors I'm sure that it doesn't even 'feel like acting'- it's not realism or naturalism- and their initial discomfort is completely understandable.

So, with this in my mind, we began the day with a super vocal warm-up (Richard Stewart leading), then set off to work and had a good morning exploring choral scenes. Over the course of the morning it (the choral speaking) began to get easier and tiny tendrils of group listening, trust and enjoyment began to emerge- and I began to get excited about the choral work in the play! It needs virtuoso team-play to make it dynamic and I love it...

In preparation for our first stagger-through, we spent a portion of the afternoon working on the game 'who moves what, where and when?' (scene changes, but it's more fun if it's a game) then we did a bit of scene work and that was the day!

Heroin and baby steps

Day One, Week 2

Slowly slowly, baby steps-

That's what I kept telling myself as we were working on the first two of three heroin hallucinations today.

It's a challenge to bring the experience of this drug



coursing through someone's veins into a theatre experience...

One of the fascinating things about this play is that a couple of the drug sections shift from an external perspective to an internal one- and while the person is hallucinating, there are plot points that happen, moving the character's emotion journey forward in the play.

Today we spent time exploring how to make the shift from the external perspective to the internal, how to show/share the sensations that Peter, (the heroin user) is experiencing and how to balance the interplay between his physical experience with his emotional progress during the hallucination.

Through the patient, slow exploration we arrived at what I would call 'a sketch' or an outline of the different components that will make up the first hallucination scene. Next time we'll explore each component more fully and then put the pieces together. It really is over an hour of rehearsal for each minute of stage time... Slowly, slowly, baby steps and trusting that the layers of investigation will accumulate into a rich, dynamic interpretation of the scene.

That was one portion of the morning. To finish the day, Bryan and I spent more time on another drug section.

This hallucination begins with a monologue that has a number of plot points, it also has a different feeling than the first hallucination and Peter narrates a large part of the 'trip', after shooting up on stage. However, what he's actually doing is recalling a hallucination, not experiencing for the first time; he is telling us about the experience and showing it to us at the same time.

I'm aware that there are traps to avoid; both the language and the physicality can quickly become redundant: we want the body and text to be communicating different parts of the story at the same time. Another trap to avoid is known as 'telling, not showing': if he stands there and narrates, that may not feel very interesting. On the other hand I don't want us to do us some bad physical impression of a heroin overdose... So, we explore the practicalities of shooting up, the sensations of a heroin high, we try physical work in silence, we try just letting the text do the work...It becomes a 'pat your head and rub your tummy at the same time' kind-of game and then, after about an hour, we arrive at 'a physical sketch' for this section. We'll come back to it again soon.

There's lots more to do on these parts of the play.

Sunday, July 11th- coiling the spring

We had a very good first week- hanging out in the world of Thamesmead and Smackheaded Peter.

Here's the welcome sign to Thamesmead in south-east London, England.



Almost through the play for the first time- and lots of excellent investigation of the scenes, characters going on. I've had a super time working with everyone- and am looking forward to rehearsal this week.

I want to catch up a bit on 'the differences' on this process...

One way that this is different is that I'm 'producing' and directing. This is the fourth time that I've created a theatre piece outside of an existing infrastructure- and then found/borrowed the money to start the process.

I'm learning lots about producing, but I've put the word in quotation marks because I'm not sure that I'm ready to say that I'm good at it. I'm hacking my way through the undergrowth and learning along the way... Some of it's an excellent experience, other times I'd really just like to think about what's going on in the rehearsal room. And sometimes I have to try and divide myself in half to 'think appropriately' depending on the meeting that I'm in. This mostly happens when I look at the budget and think about the number of tickets that we need to sell so that I can give the actors some money at the end of this process... and then (as the 'producer') I want to scale back the production even though (as the 'producer') I know that's counter-intuitive to the director's (my) vision and that she (me!) is doing everything possible to keep costs a minimal as possible... It's a little odd- and it really makes me appreciate the 'two-headed' structure of many theatre companies: and Artistic Director and a General Manager/Executive Director/(person who thinks mostly about money).

On the other hand... I also love the challenges of this process. I'm not sure I'd like to make theatre like this all the time, but it's a good change- and it's allowing me to create a play that I've wanted to direct for a long time, that is unlikely to be programmed in a theatre that has a subscription-based audience. A play with a premise involving A class drugs, even if it is a sad and cautionary tale, might be hard to justify to a board that has challenges with strong language/sexuality.

For me, some other challenges of making theatre this way include...

-making sure that people in the company/all those contributing to the process feel valued and respected, even though they're not being paid

- scheduling rehearsals for an ensemble play, (with most people on stage, most of the time), while people are also working at other jobs

-making sure that there is enough of an infrastructure to the company (without being able to pay them) that I can focus as much as possible on directing

-making sure that I have enough time to do the producing/organising and try to enjoy it!

Yee Ha!

So, today- a bit of admin. and then I'm sitting down with the play and thinking about week two. We have a stagger-through at the end of the week and good chunks of time together as a full company of nine actors. We're going to be getting the drug hallucinations 'on their feet' and practicing choral work... and I've one or two 'producing' things to do- this is a week when lots of money gets spent!

we'll be posting our one-minute video on YouTube on July 18th

And here's a draft of our poster...